Wicked Games
by Seastone Chair
Summary: Q branch is attacked while James is out on a mission and Q is left stranded and alone with a potentially fatal injury. However James still needs him, so he doesn't let on to his injuries as he continues to help Bond via his tablet and earpiece. Tumblr prompt; oneshot. Some fluff and lots of explosions. Rated T for swearing.


_A/N: Hey guys my first 00Q fic! SO EXCITED FOR IT. The plan is to beta it when I wake up again tomorrow morning or after work tomorrow... but here it is for now! I hope you like it as much as I do!_

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"Doors open," Q stated, working from his main computer at his desk. This mission didn't need the entire branch working on it. He was sitting in his office, sipping on tea and speaking to 007 through their connected earpieces and microphones. "Down the hall and to the left."

007 was following precisely what he was told as Q watched his signal tracker move on his laptop screen next to his main computer. They had only come across little confrontation and 007 took care of it in a flash.

"This seems eerily too easy," Bond growled through the mic and Q had to agree. He had calculated the enemy to resist much more.

"Don't let your guard down." Q noticed something blink on the screen of his monitor and squinted at it. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. He glanced out at Q branch and surveyed his technicians. Normal. Everything was normal. Something in his gut told him otherwise. There was a 3% chance that the blink on his screen was a malfunction. One of his technicians would have caught it and flagged it.

Q branch had a now-permanent place in the bunkers under their newly rebuilt MI6 headquarters. Basically they were in the basement, but the bunkers went on from just their branch. They traveled under the city almost like the Tube. Only these were much more fortified and had less of a chance of an electrical meltdown or hack.

His brain calculated and mapped out a quick escape route before he frowned to himself. He was being paranoid. Bond was rubbing off on him. He pushed those thoughts away for further examination later.

Q needed to be focused on the mission.

007 wasn't on a mission to some far off land like usual, he was quite close to home actually. Normally he wouldn't be sent on a mission like this, but he hadn't had a mission in about two weeks. So he volunteered for a drive by in Ireland. They had heard chatter of the mafia planning something bigger than they normally would, stepping out of their usual boundaries.

Bond's mission was to confirm and eliminate the threat.

"Why haven't we run into anyone else," Bond was mumbling to himself as he prowled the corridors and rooms.

Q took another sip from his tea and his monitor blinked again. Something was there when it blinked that time. He frowned and opened another window on his laptop to troubleshoot and search their servers for a bug.

Another blink. They were happening faster.

"Is _anyone_ getting any readings?" Q shouted from his office to his technicians. They looked up with confused looks. He heard Bond hissed at the loudness of Q's voice through the earpiece.

"Sir…" One of the closest members of his branch was staring behind him and pointed. Q turned around and looked at his wide screen monitor propped up on the wall. The screen was white when moments before it was off. A big black 'X' appeared in the center of the screen.

"Shit," Q swore under his breath and spun around to his computers on his desk. The same symbol was on his monitor and laptop. His heartbeat accelerated as he thought of his branch getting hacked again. First Silva now this…

Fingers dashed away at his keyboard, trying to work past the frozen screen. But when the computer itself froze then not even a genius like himself could get past it.

"What's happening?" Bond asked from a now unknown location. Q couldn't see where he was. He couldn't monitor him. Shit, shit, shit.

He looked up from his monitors and saw his entire branch was in sudden chaos. People were furiously typing at their keyboards, some were crouched down at the computer trying to take apart the machine and some were staring hopelessly at Q.

Q opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a tablet.

"Q, report." Bond's voice was harsh.

After booting up the tablet and accessing a remote server he managed to get the location of Bond once more.

"Bond, you're in the main office. No one is there?" Q asked, getting the sudden feeling that no one was there because they were somewhere else entirely. Somewhere much closer by. "The north door is the head office. The information should be there, just plug in the flash drive I gave you and it should hack anything they may have set up."

The real question was, who was smart enough to hack into his systems?

He flung open his office door, tablet in hand, and stormed out of his office. Q lifted a free hand to silence the microphone on his earpiece so 007 wouldn't hear anything. "No one in this bloody office caught this?!"

"Nothing's wrong with the server, sir." One of his employees said. She was the pretty redhead that kept flirting with him. His eyes flicked to her red hair and considered the possibility… She gave him a smile and lifted a hand. A remote was in it.

"Stop-!" He was abruptly cut off when she pushed a button. Every computer system in the room exploded at once. Metal, electrical wires, and shards of plastic and glass flew in every direction as he was knocked off his feet and sent sprawling onto his back.

The explosion and the screams echoed in his ears and white noise followed. His brain was trying to catch up to the present but it was blank. He couldn't move, he couldn't breathe, and he could only see bright lights.

Q rocked his body from side to side, trying to get up. He needed to move. He knew that much at least. Instincts told him to move. Managing to roll over, he pushed himself up, disoriented by the complete silence and the feeling of… absolute nothing.

_Bond._

His brain registered its first real thought and then picked up from there, trying desperately to catch onto things. Sizzling and crackling were fighting their way through his blown eardrums. Upon standing, everything slowly came back to him.

Visuals first. One lens on his glasses were blown, the other cracked. He could barely see out of the missing lens but he realized that was because the world was blind in that eye. The glass walls in his office, that once separated him from the rest of Q branch were gone. The big TV on the wall, and his computer were… gone. Only wires remained from where they once were.

He spun unsteadily on his heels and saw the rest of the horror. His employees were curled on the ground or trying to get up. Blood was everywhere and on everything. The floor was littered with glass shards and metal shrapnel. Computers were gone. Small fires were scattered where the computers once were.

Pain came next. It nearly sent him to his knees. It was white hot and all over. He ground his teeth to keep any unwanted groans at bay. Q couldn't pin point where the pain was coming from just yet.

Auditory senses came back last at full volume.

"Q! Q fucking report! What is happening!" Shouts in his ear were painfully loud. Gunshots could be heard between sentences on the other side.

Crying could be heard in his other ear. Crying and pleading from his injured technicians. Alarms were going off everywhere, alerting the entire MI6 building of problems and he knew they would be there in less than a minute.

Once there they would extract everyone and take them to Medical. Q glanced at his tablet that he managed to hang on to. It had a few scratches, but otherwise it was still useable. Thank god it was locked away from that madwoman. He needed to get Bond out. The gunshots on the other side of their connection didn't seem like they were ending.

With that decision being made, he walked through the middle of Q branch, finding he had to limp to make his way to the door. Medical would take care of his staff. He needed to go deeper into the bunker so it would take them longer to find him. He needed time for Bond.

Q finally reached up and unmuted his mic. "007," He had to take a deep shakey breath. "Report."

"About bloody time!" The agent shouted. "Got the information. They ambushed the room. What the fuck is happening over there, Q!"

The Quartermaster had to use the hall wall to support himself as he turned on his tablet. He typed in a few commands one handed and Bond's position came up on the cracked screen. He had to squint to see through one eye as he began to make his way once more deeper into the bunker.

Bond was still in the room, but he was backed into a corner. Q had to cause a distraction for Bond to have any chance to get out of the room and away.

"Setting off fire alarms for distraction," Q stopped limping to type in the command. "They infiltrated Q branch. Explosions, you would like it." The injured man let out a bark of a laugh that sounded more of a cough than anything.

Through the earpiece, the shrill sound of alarms went off then the sprinkler system turned on. Q watched his tablet as Bond's signal moved from the room to the hallway to a stair well. That worked better than Q would have thought.

But Q could have no more walking. He slid down the wall he was leaning on and sat on the ground. He was breathing louder than he was meaning to, a rasping noise following every breath. Slumped over the tablet, watching silently save for the wheezing, the pain in his body began to focus on certain spots.

His leg for one, was screaming in pain. Q glanced at it. All he could see was red. Red soaked his torn up trousers and was pooling under it. His back was another thing, but he knew what this was. It was the glass shards from his office. It had exploded behind him and now he was leaning back against the wall, pushing the shards deeper. But he couldn't move even if he wanted to. It was getting harder and harder to breathe. Each breath sent a violent shudder down his spine.

"Q," Bond's voice wasn't harsh like it had been earlier. It had a hint of concern. But then again, Q couldn't really understand much of what was happening right now so he could just as well be imaging it. The sounds of fire alarms still going off signaled that 007 hadn't gotten out of the building yet. "I can hear your breathing."

"Focus on your work, 007," Q let out a too-long breath of air. "Once you're on the first floor take two lefts and a right to get to the alley behind the pub."

"Punctured lung," Bond said. "You have a punctured lung. Why hasn't Medical hauled your ass away?"

Q's eye lids felt heavy. "I'm hiding from them." He moved his right arm across the tablet to try and peel his trousers off of his bloody leg. His good eye focused on his arm. Its entirety was burned. It wasn't a bad burn, maybe first degree from the looks of it, but it was there nonetheless.

"Stop being stubborn and go to them. I've seen people," Bond was cut off on the other line for a moment, loud crashes could be heard. Q saw his signal stay in its place as he knew the agent was fighting.

"I've seen people die from punctured lungs in minutes, Q." Suddenly 007 was back. His signal started to move towards the exit again.

"No." Q unintentionally dragged the syllable out for longer than was necessary. His ribs ached. "Need to get you back." He typed in a few commands again and the fire alarms on Bond's side silenced. Now there were just the muffled sirens in the MI6 HQ.

"I'm _fine._" But Q ignored Bond as he watched. So close, 007 was so close to the exit. The Quartermaster pulled open a new window and began to make arrangements for Bond's return. He wanted the agent back as soon as possible. He wanted to make sure the agent was safe.

"Not exactly protocol," Q began. "There's a hospital two blocks away. I've unlocked the helicopter on the landing pad and rigged all the security sensors in the building to open to your ID."

Bond's signal burst through the exit and moved quickly down streets.

"Bond…" Q's eyes blurred a bit. "I need… I need you here."

"Q, don't close your eyes. Keep talking to me."

"It was the redhead I was telling you about… The one that kept flirting. She planted small microchip explosives in all the computers. I should have known… She was always in the R&D labs…" A stuttered breath blew out from his lips. Q's eyes were so close to closing. Maybe for a moment…

"If she's still alive I will kill her myself," Bond snapped angrily. It made Q jerk awake. Had he fallen asleep? Keep talking.

"The microchips froze all of our computers. I really can't do anything when the screen freezes. Can't imput codes or commands… James please." Q's slumped over form slowly fell sideways. His final destination was laying on his side on the cold hard ground in the large pool of his blood. When had it gotten that big? Surely it was staining his cardigan.

"Keep talking," The command was sharp from Bond.

"I just- I should have kissed you before you left," Q's now useless glasses fell off his face. "I just thought it was unprofessional to do in front of coworkers. And you left so suddenly… I thought this mission would be so easy and you would be back by nightfall."

Q heard footsteps on his side. Finally they found him.

"I thought we would be in bed together again," Q whispered so only Bond could hear. "I wanted it."

"He's over here!" A shout came from down the corridor.

"Me too, Q. But I'll be there, I promise. And I'll be by your side tonight," James said, the sound of a helicopter starting sent a flood of relief through Q.

"Shit! You! Report to M we found him! Get the stretcher and let's get him up to Med now!" Another voice. Q couldn't tell who they were.

James was safe… and Q made sure of it. A small smile spread on his lips. "I expect to see you when I wake up." His voice was small as he closed his eyes.

"No, Q! I said to stay awak-" Q's world went black.

The feeling of weightlessness registered in the back of his mind and all the pain was numbed in a wash of warmth. Q felt like he could get used to this feeling. It felt like he was floating on clouds, not really living but not dead yet.

Everything was still black, but he was ok with that. It made him focus on feelings rather than visuals.

This was a stress-free environment. It was soothing and relaxing. But it was also a James Bond-free environment. Q frowned into the darkness. This would be perfect with a James Bond to accompany him. Didn't James say he would be there with him tonight? Where was he?

Q sank even deeper into the blackness where even his brain stopped thinking and processing.

He gripped onto the one thought of James sitting with him that night.

It felt like years had passed in the darkness when a painful throbbing began in his legs. Wait… he had never felt anything while under.

His back… oh god his back was burning. Was it on fire?! Q's heart began to pound and his breath began to quicken. No, no, no, breathe slow. It _hurt _to breathe. Like a boulder was crushing his lungs.

"Q," A worried voice broke into his darkness. It sounded far away. It sounded familiar. A voice he longed for once…

"Calm down, Q." That voice again, deep and smooth. An ache gripped at his heart. Oh, him. James.

It took all of Q's strength to pry open his eyelids. The room was, thankfully, darkened when his eyes adjusted to the sudden ability to see. It seemed that they had miraculously fixed his once-blind eye. He looked frantically about the room before his vision rested on a blurry image of his James.

James seemed to read Q's mind and moved to put his glasses on his face. Everything became sharp and clear. His Double O was sitting on the chair next to him. The man looked disheveled and a healthy beard had grown. Q's mind averaged the rate at which a man's beard grew without being shaved and guessed he had been out for a week, two at most.

A tired smile spread across James's lips. "I told you to stay awake."

"Well you know how much I like to listen to you," Q's voice cracked constantly, ruining his sarcastic comment.

"I never left your side," James said and with that, he leaned down to plant that kiss Q had wanted earlier on his chapped lips.


End file.
